Music and Ceremony

I’m always heartened when I read, as I did the other day, about a school retirement party where one of the central elements is a big musical performance, or when there’s a Mr. Holland’s Opus kind of thing, as there was last week. Humans throughout history have used music and dance as part of celebrations of significant life moments. In many cultures dance (and how can you separate music from dance – you can’t) still is a vital part of celebrations, though in western cultures we seem to keep dance for partying and have allowed to remain only music, usually without movement, staid and serious. Everyone has music.

This is the time of year for commencement ceremonies. What’s a commencement ceremony without music? (Hell, what’s a half-time show without music?) The band or orchestra plays at the beginning and end, sometimes “Pomp and Circumstances,” and the choir sings in the middle of the ceremony. At my son’s 8th grade “Moving Up Day” ceremony there was both playing and singing, both better than most of the speeches, of course.

Sometimes that awful piece we call our national anthem is sung, by everyone. Interesting that countries sing their anthem, all together; they don’t only play it, they don’t recite it (good thing, in the case of ours), they sing it. Communal singing.

We all know how central music is to human celebration, but in my field we dont’ just know it, we think about this all the time; in the rest of the world, it can easily be taken for granted, and usually is. But a life ceremony without any music would be odd and unfulfilling, wouldn’t it?

Congratulations to all the graduates, and thanks to all those who provide the music for these important occasions, especially those who are not graduating but are at the ceremonies to play and sing, and their inspirations, the Mr. Hollands out there.